


two of us

by dansunedisco



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Zombie Apocalypse, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Gen, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Zombies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-06
Updated: 2015-02-06
Packaged: 2018-03-10 17:16:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,043
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3298103
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dansunedisco/pseuds/dansunedisco
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clarke, Lexa, and the zombie apocalypse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	two of us

**Author's Note:**

> Please read the tags. <3

It starts innocuously enough.

She turns on the TV one morning for a weather check while she chugs her first cup of coffee. The news anchor goes on and on about a string of face-eating cannibalism. She snorts because, really, bath salts again? 

The tickler mentions something about China and ramped up Armed Forces—not good, but she’s too far removed and comfortable to really linger on that kind of news. Her eyes skip to the bottom right corner, and bingo. A high of 52.

She turns the TV off, tosses the remote on the armrest, shrugs on a jacket and heads off to work just as the sun breaks the horizon, thinking about the paperwork in her inbox she’s been sitting on for a day too long, and not at all about what she’d do different if she’d known what was coming.

 

\--

 

“Hey! _Hey!_ ” Her voice is hoarse from disuse, but it travels still. She knows this, because Clarke’s whole body tenses up and whips around in her direction, body keyed up, stance like she’s ready to run opposite. But then she recognizes Lexa, must have, because she actually starts running towards her, all arms swinging in haste, in purpose.

They meet up at the whitewashed fence, panting, bent over for a good long while, adrenaline simmering under skin. Lexa lifts her head, straightens up. 

“Clarke,” she says. “Are you—?” _Alone._  

Clarke’s jaw tightens, cheek ticks, just like it did when Lexa knew her from before. Her hair is a mess, an unraveling braid that goes past her shoulders. Her face is grimy, dirt ground into the lines of her skin. “Just me,” she says, and a twig snaps in the distance.

Lexa hasn’t seen a Walker in a long, long time. None out here, at least, and there’s a good chance that Clarke led a whole pack of them to her front porch. _Stupid_ , she thinks. They’re acting like two idiots, like they just ran into one another at the grocer’s. She backs up with two large steps, sees Clarke’s face fall like shattered glass, and something fiery and heavy settles in her gut.

“Clarke,” she says, scrubs her mouth with her palm. “Are you—?“ _Bitten_.

Clarke’s eyes, wet and shiny, implore her to believe. “No, I’m clean. I haven’t seen a Biter in days.“

“Okay,” she says. She shouldn’t be saying it, but she says it anyway. She knew Clarke once. They were barely friends, but things like the past don’t hold much weight anymore. The world’s changed for the worst and eighteen is old enough to do terrible, terrible things in exchange for survival. She should turn Clarke away, but instead she says, “Okay. Okay. Come on, let’s go.”

She helps Clarke over the fence, invites her into her parents’ old home, and prays she’s made the right choice.

 

\--

 

She wakes up the next morning with a hand on her shoulder, an incessant back and forth motion that rocks her out of sleep none too gently. She rubs the sleep out of her eyes, and peeks up through the sunlight pouring in through the lacy curtains to find Clarke, leaning over her like the world hasn’t ended already. The shock of sleeping so soundly pales to the fact that she didn’t immediately wake up when Clarke crossed the threshold into her room.

“Someone—one of them… it’s outside,” Clarke says, and Lexa rears up and heads straight to the window, Clarke hot on her heels.

 _It_ is still far off, gracelessly hobbling towards the outer fence; a lone once-woman in a rotting nightgown. It’s too far to see the gory details, but there’s enough blood to stain her a rusty red and visible in the brown-burnt grass of the fields. Lexa knows they’re too far away for it to have seen or scented them, but she won’t delude herself into thinking they will stay safe. Walkers beget walkers, and it needs to go. _She_ needs to make it—go.

She hesitates, and she’s not sure why. It’s not the first time she’s had to take care of business. The fact that she has another person here should be all the more reason for her to run out, keep them safe.

Clarke is too close, hovering like a helicopter, eyes shifting back and forth between the window and the Walker as it makes its way towards them, body rolling, feet limping. It’s the knowledge of its trajectory that sends a shiver down Lexa’s spine. As mindless as they are, there is something in their brain-dead instincts that propels them, shambling, towards four walls and a roof.

She grabs the crowbar she keeps on the sill. “Let’s go,” she says, and hustles into jeans and boots, pounds down the stairs and out the front door.

 

\--

 

The next morning she finds Clarke downstairs, sitting at the kitchen table. She’s staring at her hands, and Lexa watches her for a moment, never thinking that Clarke Griffin would _ever_ be sitting quiet in her kitchen, zombie apocalypse or no. 

She pads cross the linoleum, and ignores the way Clarke’s head pops up, the way her eyes alight like she can’t believe there’s another human being, living, breathing, talking, in front of her. She shifts uncomfortably, rubs the back of her neck and pretends like this is normal, goes about her morning routine. Puts a pot of coffee on, two pieces of toast in the mini-oven, feet dragging all the while. It’s awkward, the silence, but she’s content to let it drag on and on, if Clarke is, too. She sits down, grunts. Rude, but she’s been out of practice for months. 

It’s in-between toast when Clarke breaks the silence. Asks, “Where’s Costia?”

Lexa can tell the exact moment when she tenses up, shuts off, because Clarke colors beet red.

Dad died three years before the Walkers started walking, a heart attack while he was asleep. Mom got sick, and never woke up again, thank _God_. Indra was overseas when the phones stopped working. Costia never made it back from school. 

“What happened to Finn?” she asks, and it’s cruel. It’s so cruel, but Clarke needs to understand. She relaxes her clenched fists. “You hungry?”

Clarke’s silent. Just goes back to staring at her hands.


End file.
